Huge growth in bars and nightclubs

The huge explosion in the number of pubs, clubs and restaurants in the West End is revealed today. Some streets in Soho and around Leicester Square have seen a quadrupling in licensed premises since the early Nineties.

Across the West End there are now 3,560 places where you can be served a drink, up 35 per cent in a decade, according to the latest figures from Westminster council.

But the real rise in the number of drinkers is even more dramatic as many of the new locations are " supervenues" catering for thousands of clubbers. The capacity of West End venues licensed for music and dancing has soared from 33,000 to 128,000.

The figures also reveal how clusters of new bars and clubs - now officially classified as "stress areas" - are threatening to overwhelm some parts of central London. The most rapid growth of all has been on Wardour Street and Carlisle Street in Soho.

Under tough new Westminster council planning policies, applications for restaurants and café³ in the West End stress area will only be granted in exceptional circumstances.

The growing "evening economy" has generated tens of thousands of jobs in London and is reckoned to be worth ?3billion to the British economy.

An estimated 181,000 people work in the capital's restaurants, pubs, bars and clubs - almost 40,000 of them in Westminster alone.

Next month controversial new laws deregulating licensing will allow round-the-clock drinking for the first time.

The Government hopes to usher in a new era of more civilised "café ³ociety" drinking, free from the constraints of traditional closing times. But critics say the new law will lead to a surge in yobbish behaviour. One police chief has said it will mean "24 hours of hell" for residents.

Even before deregulation, there has already been a dramatic increase in the availability of late-night drinking in central London.

In Westminster, there are now more than 150 licensed night café³ open until the early hours, and around 60 of these serve until between 4am and 9am.

Town halls are bracing themselves for the arrival of the new regime on 7 February. From that date venues will be able to apply for extended drinking